Category: Restaurants

8° Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán: Eighth Annual Michoacán Traditional Food Festival
On October 4, 5, and 6, 2013, the Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán
will celebrate its 10th anniversary. In honor of the coming festival,
for the next three weeks, Mexico Cooks! will publishing its articles
about the prior three years of the Encuentro. In mid-October, you'll find the report of the 10th Anniversary Encuentro,
right here on Mexico Cooks!. And if you can possibly get to the 10th
Anniversary event, we'll publish all the details just as soon as we have
them. Meantime, save the dates: October 4, 5, and 6, 2013 in Morelia,
Michoacán.

Maestra Benedicta Alejo Vargas grinds cilantro and mint to prepare tzirita, a deliciously spicy botana (appetizer or snack) based on metate-ground chile seeds and various herbs.

For me, the days leading to the Eighth Annual Encuentro de Cocina
Tradicional de Michoacán moved almost as slowly as the days leading to a
five-year-old's Christmas morning. This event celebrating the
traditional cuisines of regional Michoacán, held annually during the
first weekend of December, is the high point of my personal and
professional year.

Essentials of the Michoacán kitchen: clay pots, wooden utensils, a ventilador (fan) to urge the wood fire hotter, and the skilled hands of a cook.

The Encuentro started life in 2004, sponsored by the Secretaría de Turismo and the Secretaría de Cultura del Estado de Michoacán
as well as by several generous corporate sponsors. During its eight
years, it has grown and changed, evolving into the unique event that so
many of us enjoy. Although there are many different food festivals in
Mexico, no other has the impact of the annual Encuentro.

Maestra Amparo Cervantes (left) of Tzurumútaro and Señora Paulita Alfaro of Nuevo San Juan Parangaricutiro are two of several elegant and vital grandes damas
(great ladies) of the Michoacán kitchen. They pass their recipes and
secrets of the kitchen to their daughters and granddaughters.

In November 2010, UNESCO
(the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural
Organization) announced that Mexico, and particularly the state of
Michoacán, had been officially inscribed on the Representative List of
the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Since then, Michoacán
regional cooks have proudly carried the banner of what is called el paradigma michoacano–the
Michoacán paradigm. UNESCO included those words in its award based on
miliennia-old indigenous Purhépecha way of food preparation that has
been preserved, protected, and promoted up to the present day. The
Michoacán paradigm is a model for other regional Mexican cuisines.

Freshly hand-made corn tortillas toasting on a wood-fire heated clay comal
(griddle). Note that the tortilla in the foreground is puffed up; this
is a key sign of a properly made tortilla. The tortilla will flatten
out again as it toasts. There are no tortillas like those hand-made in
Michoacán.

Much
of Michoacán's regional cuisine is based on Mexico's native corn.
These dried ears, hung up to decorate a festive food stand at the 2010 Encuentro, show just a few of the several colors of corn native to this area. The preservation of native corn varieties is crucial to the continuity of the Michoacán paradigm.

Maestra Antonina González Leandro of Tarerio, Michoacán, is radiant in her hand-embroidered blouse.

This year, the organizing committee gave special honors to a few of
the consistent winners of the cooking competition at the heart of each
annual Encuentro. These great women of the regional kitchen, now retired from competition, are the soul of this festive event. They are:
- Benedicta Alejo Vargas, San Lorenzo. Her specialities for 2010 were wild mushrooms, traditional churipo (a beef-based soup), rabbit mole, cheese mole, and tzirita.
- Juana Bravo Lázaro, Angahuan. Her specialities were atápakua de kuruchi kariri (dried fish stew), filled corundas with churipo, and two varieties of tortillas.
- Antonina González Leandro, Tarerio. She specialized in fried trout with traditional mole, tomato mole, or in a broth, pozole, and ponteduro (a kind of toasted and sweetened corn snack).
- Esperanza Galván Hernández, Zacán. Her specialties were mole tatemado con arroz (baked mole with rice), quesadillas, corundas filled with vegetables, and blue corn tortillas.
- Amparo Cervantes, Tzurumútaro. For this Encuentro, she specialized in mole con pollo y arroz (mole with chicken and rice), carne de puerco con rajas (pork meat with poblano chile strips), corundas, and uchepos.
A few of Maestra Antonina's special dishes, including (lower right) tortitas de charales, (center, in the molcajete) salsa de chile perón, (back left) nopalitos en salsa de jitomate, and (back right) caldo de trucha (freshly fried Michoacán-farmed rainbow trout in broth).

Maestra Amparo's carne de cerdo con rajas, cooking over a wood fire. She constantly tended and stirred the cazuela (clay cooking dish) so that the preparation would neither dry out nor stick.

Sra. Cayetana Nambo Rangel of Erongarícuaro prepared choricorundas, a type of pyramid-shaped corn tamal filled with cooked chorizo, a spicy pork sausage. The corunda is wrapped in a long green corn leaf (not a corn husk) and then steamed. Traditionally, corundas can be either blind (made without a filling) or filled.

Young cook Susana Servín Galván of Zacán entered the food competition with cuchiatápakua en chile verde con frijoles de la olla, a traditional dish from her small town. The dish consists of pork meat cooked in a thick sauce made of highly spicy chile serrano
and served with freshly cooked beans and blue corn tortillas. This is
my jealously guarded plateful; the dish was stunningly delicious and
sold out quickly. I was lucky to taste it.

Susana Servín Galván, the up-and-coming young cook who prepared the fabulous dish in the preceding photo.

Salsa de chile de árbol pounded into existence using this enormous molcajete y tejolote (volcanic stone mortar and pestle).

More ingredients and utensils crucial to the regional Michoacán kitchen.

Mexico Cooks! will keep you informed about the dates for the 2012 Ninth Annual Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán.
This unique event, a true look at Michoacán's regional cuisine, should
be on everyone's calendar for early December. Come with us and we will
introduce you to all of these dishes and more!

Looking for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click here: Tours.
28 de September de 2013
7º Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán: Michoacán’s Seventh Annual Festival of Traditional Cuisine

On October 4, 5, and 6, 2013, the Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán will celebrate its 10th anniversary. In honor of the coming festival, for the next three weeks, Mexico Cooks! will publishing its articles about the prior three years of the Encuentro. In mid-October, you'll find the report of the 10th Anniversary Encuentro, right here on Mexico Cooks!. And if you can possibly get to the 10th Anniversary event, we'll publish all the details just as soon as we have them. Meantime, save the dates: October 4, 5, and 6, 2013 in Morelia, Michoacán.

In Uruapan, Michoacán, on December 3, 2010, multicolored papel picado (cut paper streamers) billowed in the evening breeze to announce our tremendous pride in the VII Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán (Seventh Annual Michoacán Traditional Food Festival).

A sumptuous and traditional mole con pollo (mole with chicken) as prepared by Antonina González Leandro of Tarerio, Michoacán. Sra. González participated in the concurso de la Zona Lacustre (Lake Pátzcuaro region competition) that took place this year in Pátzcuaro. In addition to this mole, she prepared pozole de elote con conejo (fresh-corn stew with rabbit), several other savory dishes, and a wonderful sweet dried-corn snack called ponteduro.

In
Pátzcuaro on December 4, 2010, Sra. Antonina González paused at her
booth to pose with Cynthia Martínez, in charge of Morelia's Restaurante
San Miguelito.

Each of the last several years, Mexico Cooks!
has been privileged to be included on the teams of speakers, judges,
and hosts for Michoacán's annual traditional cuisine spectacular. This
year, our joyous cup of participation in the festival was filled to
overflowing by the two-week-prior notice that Mexico's cuisine, and
especially the cuisine of Michoacán, had been designated as a UNESCO
Intangible Heritage of Humanity–the first cuisine in the world to be so
honored. Three cities in central Michoacán (Morelia, Uruapan, and
Pátzcuaro) were named to host this year's food festival, and all three
went completely overboard in welcoming every participant: host
committees, notable chefs and food writers from all parts of Mexico and
other countries, hundreds of proud and happy local and regional eaters,
and the people without whom there would be no reason to have the party:
the stupendous traditional cooks from the Purhépecha communities
throughout this part of the state.

In Morelia on December 5, 2010, Dra. Gloria López Morales, president of the Conservatorio de la Cultura Gastronómica Mexicana, shares her views on topics related to Mexico's November 2010 triumph at UNESCO.

In Pátzcuaro, Mexico Cooks!
talks about Michoacán cuisine with (left) Christian Plotzcyk and
(right) David Suárez of the New York restaurant group Rosa Mexicano.

A
number of internationally known chefs and food writers attended the
festival this year. Among them were Patricia Quintana, Alicia Gironella
d'Angeli, Rubén Hernández, Roberto González Guzmán, Sol Rubín de
Borbolla, Cristina Palacio, and Gabriel Gutiérrez García, all from
Mexico City; Cynthia Martínez, Alma Cervantes, and Joaquín Bonilla of
Morelia; and Susana Trilling of Oaxaca. In addition, David Suárez and
Christian Plotzcyk of the Rosa Mexicano restaurant group based in New
York City and Iliana de la Vega of Restaurante El Naranjo, Austin, Texas, represented the interest of the United States. The
festival also counted on the participation of internationally renowned
Michoacán chefs Rubí Silva Figueroa (Restaurante Los Mirasoles,
Morelia), Lucero Soto Arriaga (Restaurante LU, Morelia), and Blanca
Estela Vidales (Restaurante La Mesa de Blanca, Ziracuaretiro,
Michoacán), who, along with teams of cooks and assistants, prepared
several banquets for specially invited festival participants and guests.

In Uruapan, we tasted delicious jahuacatas (corundas created using layers of frijoles molidos (beans ground on the traditional metate) and fresh masa (corn dough), as prepared by Sra. Juanita Bravo Lázaro from Angahuan, Michoacán. Sra. Bravo served these marvelous jahuacatas with an atápakua de calabaza
(thick squash sauce). This preparation won the prize for the best
traditional dish. Click on the photograph to enlarge the picture for a
better view of the layers.

None of the judges had previously heard of–much less tasted–these incredibly delicious yurucurindas. Once we tasted them in Uruapan, we couldn't stop recommending them to everyone in earshot. "Hurry, get one before they're gone!" we mumbled with our mouths full. Similar in size to but a bit thicker than a standard corn tortilla, the yurucurindas are made from blue corn masa, piloncillo (Mexican raw sugar cones), and canela molida (ground cinnamon), and then baked on a traditional comal de barro (clay griddle). Even this long after the festival, the photo still makes my mouth water at the memory!

Señora Benedicta
Alejo Vargas of San Lorenzo, Michoacán is one of the greatest
traditional cooks in the Uruapan area. The internationally known Sra.
Alejo won the prize for best rescued dish with churipo de carne seca
(dried beef soup in the Purhépecha style). Rescued dishes include
traditional preparations that are not usually prepared today and are on
the verge of extinction. Photo courtesy Gabriel Gutiérrez García.

Mexico Cooks!
noticed this basket of fresh green leaves on the table at Sra. Alejo's
booth and asked what purpose they served. Sra. Alejo smiled and said,
"When I was a little girl, my grandmother always put a basket of leaves
on the table to use as napkins. It's part of my family's tradition."
In addition to her prize-winning traditional churipo, Sra. Alejo prepared mole de conejo (rabbit mole), mole de queso (cheese mole), and tzirita, a botana (appetizer) made of finely ground chile seeds and other savory ingredients.

For
the first time, acclaimed chef (she's the owner of Mexico City's
restaurant Izote) and author Patricia Quintana attended the Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional. She happily served as a judge.

Absolutely gorgeous: hot-off-the-comal tortillas, made with two colors of corn masa.

Thick and delicious atole de chaqueta is a corn-based hot drink flavored, in this instance, with the toasted and ground outer shells of the cacao
(chocolate) bean. Nothing is wasted here in Michoacán's kitchens:
imagine that such delicious things are made from what you might discard:
chile seeds and the hulls of cocoa beans!

In
addition to the wonderful food competition, the festival organization
treated the Uruapan public to a marvelous evening of traditional music
and dance.

At the December 5, 2010 Morelia closure of the VII Encuentro de Cocina Tradicional de Michoacán, the prize-winning cocineras
(cooks) and other dignitaries posed with (left foreground) Sra. Alicia
Gironella d'Angeli, First Lady of Mexico's food world and chef/owner at
Restaurante El Tajín in Mexico City and Dr. Genovevo Figueroa, secretary
of tourism for the state of Michoacán. Both Sra. Gironella and Dr.
Figueroa are long-time supporters of this annual Michoacán festival.
Photo courtesy Rubén Hernández.

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21 de September de 2013
VIVA MÉXICO! For Independence Day, Chiles en Nogada, the Mexican Flag on Your Plate
The whole month of September is a big party: the Fiestas Patrias (National Celebrations).
Here, a street stand offering Mexican flags, hanging banners, and a lot of small Independence-related items for sale.

Mexico
celebrates its independence during the entire month of September with parades,
parties, and traditional food and drink in restaurants and at home. The
traditional festive dish during the weeks before and after the
Independence Day holiday is chiles en nogada, a magnificent tribute to the seasonal availability of granadas (pomegranates) and fresh nuez de Castilla (walnuts). From late August till early October, fresh pomegranates and frsh walnuts make chiles en nogada possible. Mildly spicy chiles poblano, stuffed with picadillo and topped with richly creamy walnut sauce and pomegranate seeds, flaunt the brilliant green, white and red of the Mexican flag.

Chiles en nogada: chiles poblano, roasted, peeled, stuffed with picadillo (in this case, a fruity Mexican hash), and plated with walnut sauce, pomegranate seeds, and fresh cilantro.

This
festive dish is
traditionally served on September 15 or 16 in honor of Mexico's
Independence Day, though it is popular anytime in the late summer and
fall. During
August and September in the highlands of Mexico, particularly in Mexico
City and Puebla on the streets bordering the markets, village women can
be seen sitting on blankets painstakingly peeling off the brown skin
from each individual walnut. It is important to use recently harvested walnuts, the freshest possible, as they produce such a creamy, rich sauce that it is
worth the effort demanded to peel them. Yes, the recipe is time-consuming…but you and your guests will jump up and shout "VIVA!" when you've licked the platters clean.

Ingredients

For the Meat
- 2 pounds beef brisket or other stew meat or 1 pound beef and 1 pound pork butt
- 1 small white onion, quartered
- 2 large cloves garlic
- about 1 Tablespoon sea salt
For the Picadillo
- 4 Tablespoons safflower or canola oil
- 1/3 cup chopped white onion
- 3 large cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
- 3 heaping Tablespoons raisins
- 1 or 2 chiles serrano, finely minced
- 2 Tablespoons chopped walnuts or pecans
- 2 Tablespoons chopped candied pineapple
- 1 fresh pear, peeled and chopped
- 1 apple, peeled and chopped
- 1 large potato, peeled and diced
- 3 large, ripe tomatoes, roasted, peeled and chopped
- sea salt to taste
For the Chiles
- 6 fresh chiles poblano , roasted, peeled, and seeded, leaving the stem intact
For the Walnut Sauce
- 1 cup fresh walnuts (available only at this time of the year)
- 6 ounces doble crema or cream cheese (not fat free) at room temperature
- 1-1/2 cups crema mexicana or 1-1/4 cups sour cream thinned with milk
- about 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
- 1 Tablespoon sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 cup dry sherry (optional)
For the Garnish
- 1 Tablespoon chopped cilantro leaves
- 1/2 cup fresh pomegranate seeds
Preparation

Cut
the meat into large chunks, removing any excess fat. Place the meat
into a large Dutch oven with the onion, garlic, and salt. Cover with
cold water and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Skim off any foam
that collects on the surface. Lower the heat and allow the water to
simmer about 45 minutes, until the meat is just tender. Take the pot
off the stove and let the meat cool in the broth. Remove the pieces of
meat and finely shred them.

Warm
the oil in a large, heavy skillet and sauté the onion and garlic over
medium heat until they turn a pale gold. Stir in the shredded meat and
cook for 5 minutes. Add the cinnamon, pepper, and cloves, then, stir in
the raisins, the 2 Tablespoons chopped walnuts. Add the chopped pear,
apple, and potato, and mix well. Add the tomatoes and salt to taste,
and continue cooking over medium-high heat until most of the moisture
has evaporated. Stir often so that the mixture doesn't stick. Let cool,
cover, and set aside. The picadillo may be made a day or two in advance.

Make a slit down the side of each chile, just long enough to remove the seeds and veins. Keep the stem end intact. Drain the chiles on paper towels until they are completely dry. Cover and set aside. The chiles may be prepared a day in advance.

At
least 3 hours in advance, place the walnuts in a small pan of
boiling water. Remove from the heat and let them sit for 5 minutes.
Drain the nuts and, when cool, rub off as much of the dark skin as
possible. Chop the nuts into small pieces. Place the nuts, cream cheese, crema,
and salt in a blender and purée thoroughly. Stir in the optional sugar,
cinnamon, and sherry, if using, until thoroughly combined. Chill for
several hours.

When ready to serve, reheat the meat filling and stuff the chiles until plump and just barely closed. Place the chiles
on a serving platter or on individual plates, cover with the chilled
walnut sauce, and sprinkle with the cilantro and
pomegranate seeds.

This dish can also be served at room temperature, or it may be served chilled.

Photos 2, 3, 4, and 5 courtesy of Jesús Guzmán Moya, M.D., of Puebla, Puebla, México. Enjoy more of Dr. Guzmán's lovely photos here. Gracias, amigo Chucho!

Provecho!

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for a tailored-to-your-interests specialized tour in Mexico? Click
here: Tours.
14 de September de 2013
La Teca–Isthmus of Tehuantepec Cooking in Oaxaca: Cocina Istmeña Oaxaqueña

Good friend and chef Rodolfo Castellanos with his adorable daughter
Elisa. Chef Rodolfo owns Restaurante Origen in Oaxaca. He and his wife, Lisette, asked me to join them for comida (the main meal of the day) at Oaxaca's Restaurant La Teca, where chef Rodolfo ordered an incredible meal for us.

While in Oaxaca with a writers' group, I took a little
time away from that group to visit another group: several culinary-world
friends who live and work in this southern Mexico city. I played
hooky to eat on Friday with Pilar Cabrera at her wonderful restaurant La Olla,
and on Saturday with chef Rodolfo Castellanos and his family at La
Teca, a restaurant specializing in cooking from the Isthmus of
Tehuantepec.

The Isthmus of Tehuantepec is the skinniest part of mainland Mexico,
lying between the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. Prior to the
opening of the Panama Canal, it was the most important route for goods
working their slow way across the relatively flat lands between the two
bodies of water. Partly in Oaxaca, partly in Chiapas, partly in Tabasco
and partly in Veracruz, the territory has its own legends, its own
history, and its own cuisines.

You
may not be aware that you are already familiar with the native dress of
the Tehuanas, as the women of the isthmus are known. Above, a Frida
Kahlo 1948 self portrait, dressed as a Tehuana. Image courtesy of: http://www.earlywomenmasters.net

Just off the beaten tourist track in Oaxaca, Restaurant La Teca serves
outstanding food from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The welcoming owner
and cook, Señora Deyanira Aquino, will make sure that you eat your fill
of her marvelous regional cuisine.

The cooking of the Isthmus is traditionally corn-based and
idiosyncratic. Most ingredients are indigenous to its hot lowlands (for
example, armadillo and iguana) and its proximity to the sea: fresh and
dried shrimp, fresh fish, and other creatures from the ocean depths.

At La Teca we shared a platter of garnachas, a traditional entrada or botana (appetizer or snack) based on a fried disk of corn dough and topped with a mixture of meat, vegetables, and salsa.

Tamalitos de cambray from Tehuantepec, savory-sweet tamales made of chicken, raisins, olives, almonds, and capers.

These are molotes de plátano macho (small, sweetly ripe plantain croquettes) topped with crema de mesa (table cream) and queso fresco (fresh cheese). The three of us shared an order of four molotes.
We kept dividing the last one into smaller and smaller pieces so that
one of us did not hog the whole thing–although each of us would have!

Next course at La Teca: a taco filled with a small chile pasilla oaxaqueño relleno
(a regional dried chile, reconstituted, stuffed, and fried). It
doesn't look like anything special, does it? If you could just enjoy
the fragrance, I assure you that you would want to lick your monitor.

Tamales de elote (fresh corn tamales) followed, served with crema de mesa. These reminded me very much of Michoacán uchepos, another kind of fresh corn tamales.

Another traditional dish from the Isthmus, estofado de bodas
(wedding stew). It's a delicious long-cooked combination of beef,
fruits, chiles, and other spices, typically served at weddings.

Purée de papa, estilo Istmeño (potatoes, coarsely mashed and then baked, Isthmus style).

Asado de puerco con mole (pork roasted with mole, from Tehuantepec).

The owner and chief cook at La Teca is Sra. Deyanira Aquino, born and raised in the Isthmus. Women of the region are called 'tecas'–from Tehuantepec–hence the name of the restaurant.

You are probably well aware of the mythical seven moles
of Oaxaca, and although the state is best known for those, there are
many other less-well-known but equally wonderful dishes available to
visitors. By all means go see Sra. Aquino at La Teca; you will be as
thrilled by everything you eat as we were. This is not fancy, high-end
designer-plated food. Your palate will be delighted by traditional
Tehuantepec home-style cooking. And oh my god, you might exclaim, did the three of you really eat all that? We most assuredly did, every bite, and so will you.

Restaurant La Teca
Calle Violetas #200-A
Colonia Reforma
Oaxaca, Oaxaca
01.951.515.0563 (from within Mexico)

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31 de August de 2013
Regional Food and Drink in Oaxaca: Buen Provecho! (Good Appetite!) with Mexico Cooks!

In Oaxaca, the state's fine regional drink–mezcal, la bebida de los dioses (the drink of the gods)–is almost as common as water. Whether enjoyed from a shot glass or sipped from a traditional jícara (a small dried half-gourd), the smoky taste of mezcal combines perfectly with sal de gusano (worm salt, pictured above in the clay bowl) and fresh orange slices.

A couple of years ago, Mexico Cooks! was invited to Oaxaca as a guest of Mexico Today,
a new Mexican government initiative designed to promote all the best of
Mexico to the world. Twenty-four diverse writers–all with a passion
for Mexico–met in Oaxaca to bond and to learn about the new program we
would soon be representing to our readers. As you might imagine, Mexico Cooks! thought what's cooking in Oaxaca was one of the major highlights of the trip.

We experienced our first Oaxaca cena (late-evening supper) at Pitiona,
the new and highly touted restaurant owned by young Chef José Manuel
Baños Rodríguez. Along with several other courses, he served our group
this estofado de carne de res con mole (braised beef tongue with mole).
The three pale-green globes are olive liquid that burst in the mouth to
release the pure essence of green olive. The beef? Delicious, tender
tongue. Some of our group could barely believe that beef tongue, of all
things, could be so wonderful.

My good friend Lisa Coleman, went with me the next day for a relatively light comida (the main meal of Mexico's day) at Pilar Cabrera's marvelous restaurant, La Olla. Our first course was a plate of four of these tostadas callejeras (street-food-style tostadas). Not one smidgen of anything–not tomato, not guacamole, not lettuce, not the crispy corn tostada and certainly not the delicious Oaxaca-style chorizo (spicy sausage)–remained on the plate after we finished the course.

Chef Alejandro Ruiz closely supervised the preparation of a beautiful and amazingly delicious Saturday-night cena for a special group. A candle-lit mezcal and jamaica (infusion of hibiscus flower) martini started our elegant meal at Restaurante Casa Oaxaca.

Chef Alejandro explains one of the fine points of the dinner preparation.

The Casa Oaxaca cebiche (marinated raw fish) appetizer, served with mango cubes, onion, cilantro, and an espejo (literally mirror, but in this case, a pool) of marinade that included jugos de limón y maracuyá (key lime and passionfruit juices). This socko flavor combination was the hit of the night for me.

Next week: a delightful restaurant for home-style regional Oaxacan cuisine.

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24 de August de 2013
Mercado 20 de noviembre, Oaxaca: Shop the 20 de noviembre Market with Mexico Cooks!

For the next two or three weeks, Mexico Cooks! will take you on a virtual trip to Oaxaca. Enjoy!

Emblematic of Oaxaca and its mezcal culture, sal de gusano (worm salt) and a wedge of fresh orange are the truly Oaxacan accompaniments to a shot of what Mexicans call la bebida de los dioses (the drink of the gods). And yes, sal de gusano is made with sea salt, ground chile, and dried, toasted and ground maguey worms. I promise you that it is delicious.

The last morning of Mexico Cooks!' recent stay in Oaxaca, I grabbed a friend and headed off to the city's famous Mercado Benito Juárez. The market is in many ways similar to but in many ways different from those that Mexico Cooks! knows best, the traditional markets of Mexico's Central Highlands. Both my friend and I were fascinated by what we saw and learned while we were poking around among the stalls.

The large carved bowls at the top of the basket and several of the smaller carved bowls to the lower right–including the laquered red ones–are actually jícaras (dried gourds). Jícaras are traditionally used for drinking mezcal. Around the edge of the basket you see sonajas (rattles), in this case whole dried gourds on sticks. The seeds dry inside the gourds to provide the sound effects when you shake the stick.

Rural Oaxaca grows chiles of all kinds, including some that are unique to the state. These are dried chile chilhuacle negro, arguably the most expensive chile in Mexico. Retail price? Eight hundred pesos the kilo–about $75 USD for 2.2 pounds, at today's exchange rate.

Bags, bags, and more bags–all plastic–sell at two adjacent market stands. The bolsas (bags) range from the little zipper change purses in the basket at lower right to the big woven market bags on the left and at the rear. Mexico Cooks! came home with two of the big ones.

Mexican chile terminology is filled with contradictions. These are chiles pasillas oaxaqueños (Oaxacan pasilla chiles). Chiles pasillas are different sizes, shapes, colors, and flavors depending on where you are in Mexico, but these are unique to Oaxaca.

Moronga is pork blood sausage. The blood is heavily seasoned with ruda (rue), oregano, fresh mint, onions and chile and then stuffed into pigs' intestines and boiled for as much as several hours.

Chile de agua (literally, water chile) is another specialty pepper from Oaxaca. Some folks say its heat is medium, some folks swear it's hot as hell, and everyone agrees that it's very difficult to find outside Oaxaca. Look back a few weeks on Mexico Cooks! to see a wonderful use for these small chiles. I loved the flavor and the picor (heat factor).

Three of Oaxaca's famous moles. These are sold as pastes, by weight. You simply reconstitute them with chicken broth at home and serve them with the meat of your choice. Mexico Cooks! is crazy about carne de cerdo con mole negro (pork with black mole).

We'll come back to Oaxaca, just to give you a sample of marvelous food and drink–next Saturday morning, right here at Mexico Cooks!. Be ready for more regional Oaxacan specialties.

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17 de August de 2013
La Feria del Chile (The Chile Fair) in Queréndaro, Michoacán
This article, originally published in September 2008, is current once again. The Feria del Chile de Queréndaro is happening this weekend, August 9-11, 2013. If you're in the vicinity of Queréndaro, Michoacán, by all means get there.

We fell in love with these wee ballet folklórico performers, children no more than four years old.

For
the last seven years, just around the late July-early August harvest
time, the town of Queréndaro, Michoacán, has celebrated the Feria del Chile (chile
fair). The center of town fills with rides for children, booths
specializing in all sorts of food, games of chance, a big stage for
daily ballet folklórico and nightly music, and all the usual whoopdedoo of fiesta time. The star of the fiestas is, of course, the chile chilaca.

In Queréndaro, Michoacán, daily work is all about locally grown chiles chilaca.

About 3 thousand acres of chile chilaca are
planted in the central Mexican states of
Aguascalientes, Jalisco, Guanajuato, Zacatecas and Michoacán. Many of
the residents of Queréndaro, Michoacán commercially cultivate this
particular chile.

All work and no play is no good, though. This sign on a Queréndaro grocer's door says, "Beer and wine for the road".

These chiles chilaca matured to their ripe, deep-red color before harvest.

The chile chilaca also has other
names such as negro (black), prieto (dark), or, particularly here in Michoacán, chile para
deshebrar (chile to tear in small strips). High quality chilaca is long, slender and
undulated. Each chile can measure a foot long. Before its fully-ripe state the chilaca is inky blue-green, with color and flavor similar to the chile poblano. Here in Michoacán, where there are at least two names for every growing thing, the fresh chile chilaca is coloquially known as the cuernillo (little horn).

Most of the locally grown deep-red chiles chilaca are dried in the sun. These are spread out along a main street in Queréndaro. The chiles are drying on petates, mats made of woven lake reed.

The chilaca turns dark reddish-brown when it's allowed to ripen on the bush. When ripe and then dried in the Queréndaro sun, the chilaca becomes very dark red and is called chile pasilla. If the seeds are removed from the dried chile, its name is chile capón. Chiles capones literally means 'castrated' chiles. This vegetable castration refers to the removal of the seeds prior to cooking.

Some chilacas are sold bottled, either en escabeche (pickled in vinegar) or as chiles capones (dried, seeded, soaked, toasted, and then cooked with onion), to be used as a botana or condimento (appetizer or condiment).

These are chiles chilaca rellenos—chiles capones stuffed with tomates verdes (tomatillos), onion, and garlic. The chiles in the photo, prepared for carry-out at the Alberto Gómez family booth , still needed to be topped with shredded Oaxaca cheese.

The Barajas family of Queréndaro offered this variety of freshly harvested chiles at their booth at the Feria del Chile. Clockwise beginning with the dark green chiles at the bottom of the basket, they are:
- chiles poblano…………14 pesos per kilo
- chiles güero……………14 pesos per kilo
- chiles chilaca verde……12 pesos per kilo
- chiles cola de rata……..50 pesos per kilo (for dry chiles; the booth was out of fresh)
- chiles poblano rojo…….14 pesos per kilo
Mexico Cooks! bought a kilo of fresh mature (red) chiles chilaca.
We've been preparing them in various dishes. The flavor they add is
deeply sweet and deadly hot. So far, our favorite recipe is with
potatoes, onions, and flor de calabaza (squash blossoms). Here's what to do:

Papas con Flor de Calabaza y Chile

Ingredients
3 large white potatoes, russets if you can get them
1 medium white onion
2 fresh mature chiles chilaca
1 large clove garlic
2 bunches fresh flor de calabaza (squash blossoms)
Flour
Vegetable oil or freshly rendered lard
Water
Sea salt

Utensils
Large pot
Colander
Griddle
Small plastic bag
Large plastic bag
Large sauté pan
Spatula

Procedure
Peel
and cube (approximately 3/4") the potatoes. Bring salted water to boil
in a pot large enough for them. Boil the potatoes until tender
(approximately 15 minutes) and strain. Allow the potatoes to dry for 30
minutes or more.

Wash and rough-chop the squash blossoms. Discard their stems.

Dice the onion to approximately 1/2". Mince the garlic.

Heat the dry griddle and roast the chiles until they are blackened. Put them in the small plastic bag, twist it closed, and allow the chiles to "sweat" for about 10 minutes. Peel and seed. Slice the chiles in 1/2" rounds.

Heat
the oil or lard in the sauté pan. While it heats, put approximately
1/2 cup flour and a teaspoon of sea salt into the large plastic bag.
Add the potatoes to the bag and shake until the potatoes are dredged
with flour and salt.

Sauté the onions, garlic, and chiles.
Add the potatoes and continue to sauté until the potatoes are golden
brown. Add the squash blossoms and sauté briefly–the blossoms will
wilt. Add sea salt to taste.

Serves 3 or 4 as a side dish.

¡Provecho!

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10 de August de 2013
Home Cooking–Traditional Mexican Food, Just Like Mamá Used to Make

Carnicería (meat market), Mercado San Juan, Morelia, Michoacán. Would you consider this big pink pig head to be 'authentic' Mexican food? It truly is; every part of the head is used in Mexico for preparing one dish or another. Most commonly, the head is used for making pozole.

More and
more people who want to experience "real"Mexican food are asking about the
availability of authentic Mexican meals outside Mexico. Bloggers and posters on food-oriented websites have vociferously
definite opinions on what constitutes authenticity. Writers' claims range from the uninformed
(the fajitas at such-and-such a restaurant are totally authentic, just like in Mexico) to the ridiculous (Mexican cooks in Mexico can't get good ingredients, so
Mexican meals prepared in the United States are superior).

Much of
what I read about authentic Mexican cooking reminds me of that old story of the
blind men and the elephant. "Oh," says
the first, running his hands up and down the elephant's leg, "an elephant is
exactly like a tree." "Aha," says the
second, stroking the elephant's trunk, "the elephant is precisely like a
hose." And so forth. If you haven't experienced what most posters
persist in calling "authentic Mexican", then there's no way to compare any
restaurant in the United States with anything that is prepared or
served in Mexico. You're simply spinning your wheels.

The blind men and the elephant.

It's my
considered opinion that there is no such thing as one definition of authentic
Mexican. Wait, before you start
hopping up and down to refute that, consider that "authentic" is generally what
you were raised to appreciate. Your
mother's pot roast is authentic, but so is my mother's. Your aunt's tuna salad is the real deal, but
so is my aunt's, and they're not the least bit similar.

The
descriptor I've come to use for many dishes is 'traditional'. We can
even argue about that adjective, but it serves to describe the
traditional dish of–oh, say carne de
puerco en chile verde–as served in the North of Mexico, in the Central
Highlands, or in the Yucatán. There may
be big variations among the preparations of this dish, but each preparation is
traditional and each is authentic in its region.

I think
that in order to understand the cuisines of Mexico, we have to give up arguing about
authenticity and concentrate on the reality of certain dishes.

Traditional Mexican pork tacos al pastor (shepherd-style tacos) are a derivation of shawarma, traditional Middle Eastern spit-roasted lamb, chicken, or beef, imported to Mexico by Lebanese immigrants during the 19th century.

Traditional
Mexican cooking is not a hit-or-miss let's-make-something-for-dinner
proposition based on "let's see what we have in the despensa (pantry)." Traditional Mexican cooking is as complicated and precise as traditional
French cooking, with just as many hide-bound conventions as French cuisine imposes. You can't just throw some chiles and a glob of chocolate into a
sauce and call it mole. You can't simply decide to call something Mexican salsa when it's not. There are specific recipes to follow,
specific flavors and textures to expect, and specific results to attain. Yes, some liberties are taken, particularly
in Mexico's new alta
cocina (haute cuisine) and fusion
restaurants, but even those liberties are generally based on specific traditional recipes.

In recent
readings of food-oriented websites, I've noticed questions about what
ingredients are available in Mexico. The posts have gone on to ask
whether or not those ingredients are up to snuff when compared with what's
available in what the writer surmises to be more sophisticated food sources
such as the United States.

Frijoles peruanos (so-called Peruvian beans) heating in lard, almost ready to be mashed with a blackened chile serrano, resulting in Mexico's ubiquitous and iconic frijolitos refritos (well-fried beans).

Surprise,
surprise: most readily available fresh foods in Mexico's markets are even better than similar
ingredients you find outside Mexico. Foreign chefs who tour with me to visit Mexico's stunning produce markets are inevitably
astonished to see that what is grown for the ordinary home-cook user is
fresher, more flavorful, more attractive, and much less costly than similar ingredients
available in the United States.

It's the
same with most meats: pork and chicken are head and shoulders above what you
find in North of the Border meat markets. Fish and seafood are from-the-sea fresh and distributed every day, within just a
few hours of any of Mexico's coasts.

A traditional way to prepare and plate chiles poblano rellenos
(stuffed poblano chiles): a poblano chile, roasted, peeled, and seeded,
then stuffed with a melting white cheese. The chile is then dredged
with flour and covered with an egg batter and fried. It's served
floating in a pool of very light, mildly spicy caldillo (tomato broth).

Nevertheless,
Mexican restaurants in the United States make do with the less-than-superior
ingredients found outside Mexico. In fact, some downright delicious traditional Mexican meals can be had
in some North of the Border Mexican restaurants. Those restaurants are hard to find, though,
because in the States, most of what has come to be known as Mexican cooking is
actually Tex-Mex cooking. There's
nothing wrong with Tex-Mex cooking, nothing at all. It's just not traditional Mexican cooking. Tex-Mex is great food
from a particular region of the United States. Some of it is adapted from Mexican cooking and some is the invention of
early Texas settlers. Some innovations are adapted from
both of those points of origin. Fajitas, ubiquitous on Mexican
restaurant menus all over the United States, are a typical Tex-Mex
invention. Now available in Mexico's restaurants, fajitas are offered to the tourist trade as prototypically authentic.

You need to
know that the best of Mexico's cuisines is not found in
restaurants. It comes straight from
somebody's mama's kitchen. Clearly not
all Mexicans are good cooks, just as not all Chinese are good cooks, not all
Italians are good cooks, etc. But the
most traditional, the most (if you will) authentic Mexican meals are home
prepared.

The simple ingredients of caldo de pollo (Mexican chicken soup) may vary in one or two aspects from region to region, but the traditional basis is what you see: the freshest chicken, onion, carrots, chile, and cilantro give flavor to the broth.

That
reality is what made Diana Kennedy who she is today: for 50 years, she has taken the time to
travel Mexico, searching for the best of the best of the
traditional preparations. For the most
part, she didn't find them in fancy restaurants, homey comedores (small commercial dining rooms) or fondas
(tiny working-class restaurants). She found them as she stood next to
the stove in a home kitchen, watching Doña Fulana (Mrs. So-and-So) prepare comida (the midday main meal of the day) for her family. She took the time to educate her palate,
understand the ingredients, taste what was offered to her, and learn, learn,
learn from home cooks before she started putting traditional recipes,
techniques, and stories on paper. If we
take the time to prepare recipes from any of Ms. Kennedy's many cookbooks, we
too can experience her wealth of experience and can come to understand what
traditional Mexican cooking can be. Her books bring Mexico's kitchens to us when we're not able to go to Mexico.

Diana Kennedy at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma Mexicana, June 2011.

In order to understand the cuisines of Mexico, we need to experience
their riches. Until that
time, we can argue till the cows come home and you'll still be just another blind
guy patting the beast's side and exclaiming how the elephant is mighty like a
wall.

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3 de August de 2013
On the Table: Mexico Cooks! Dines Out and Dines at Home

A whole frog, battered, deep fried and served with chiles toreados (chile serrano, rolled in oil and grilled or sautéed until soft), cebolla blanca (white onion, in this case caramelized), and limón to squeeze all over it. Deep fried frogs are a specialty of Queréndaro, Michoacán. It's a truly graphic presentation, but you only eat the legs–unless you care to nibble on other parts.

A Sunday afternoon on the trajineras (boats) in Xochimilco requires a refueling stop at a 'restaurant' trajinera. In this case, our midday meal was juicy carne asada (grilled meat) and quesadillas cooked to order, guacamole and tortilla chips, rice, beans, and hot-off-the griddle tortillas. Delicious!

Mexico Cooks! discovered Panadería Manduca at Av. Nuevo León #125-B during the November Col. Condesa bakery crawl and hasn't stopped buying their marvelous made-on-site pretzel bread. The bread is dense, extremely flavorful, and just the way we like it.

Still on the bread theme, here's the pan de romero (rosemary bread) from Rosetta, a lovely Italian restaurant at Calle Colima 166, Col. Roma Sur, Mexico City. Next time we eat there, I promise you a report on London-trained chef Elena Reygada's wonderful food.

Home cooking: Mexico Cooks! prepared the hot, fennel-y Italian sausage and then created sausage, peppers, and onion sandwiches for a recent meal at home.

Another home-cooked meal: eggplant parmagiana. Peter Francis Battaglia, an Italian-American friend in New Jersey, keeps me inspired to try his recipes. Once you've read his web page and seen his photos, you'll be equally inspired.

Once every six weeks or so, Azul/Condesa or Azul/Histórico call out to us. It's difficult for me to resist the pechuga de pollo en mole negro (chicken breast in black mole). For me, Chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita's mole negro recipe continues to be the gold standard for this dish.

To end on a sweet note: these buñuelos–foot-in-diameter deep-fried flour pastry, finished with a dash of granulated sugar and cinnamon, broken onto a plate or into a bowl and bathed with syrup made of piloncillo–were on the fonda table (small family food booth or restaurant) next to me the last time I was in Morelia, Michoacán. Could you resist? I couldn't.

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20 de July de 2013
Flaneur Redux: Mexico City Places to Go, People to See, Things to Eat and Drink…

Chocolate a la española (Spanish-style hot chocolate), Café El Popular, 5 de Mayo #40, Centro Histórico.

San Antonio de Padua
(St. Anthony of Padua), José Guadalupe Posada. Collection Carlos
Monsiváis, Museo del Estanquillo, Isabel la Católica #26, Centro
Histórico.

Pepitorias for sale at San Ángel's delightful Bazar Sábado.

Just a shell of its former self, a shadow of its former glory. Remains of private home, Colonia Roma.

A bolero is not always a song. Shoeshine stand, Centró Histórico, DF.

Santuario de San Charbel (Sanctuary of Saint Charbel), Calle Uruguay, Mexico City.

MetroBús stop, Glorieta Insurgentes. Another kind of shadow.

MetroBús, Glorieta Insurgentes.

Gradas al Atardecer (Stairway at Dusk), Escuela de Gastronomía Mexicana, Col. Roma.

Cocktail hour sunglasses from the 1960s, modeled by the vendor. La Lagunilla.

18th
Century barroque Templo de la Profesa, Isabel la Católica esq.
Francisco Madero, Centro Histórico. From the rooftop, Museo del
Estanquillo.

Champurrado (atole, a thick, hot corn-based drink, in this instance made with chocolate), Restaurante Flor de Lis, Col. Condesa.

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6 de July de 2013